


in bars, in cars

by moonix



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Exy (All For The Game), Asexuality, Asexuality Spectrum, Cats, Classical Music, Communication, Consent, Demisexual Neil Josten, Demisexuality, Eden's Twilight, M/M, Masturbation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-05
Updated: 2020-01-05
Packaged: 2021-02-27 08:21:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,140
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22133965
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moonix/pseuds/moonix
Summary: “I guess I just don’t understand it. How can you just be attracted to a complete stranger?”“That’s the appeal,” Andrew retorts.“What?”“It’s a simple transaction. No complications.”“Complications? Like what?”“Conversation, obligations, baggage,” Andrew says dismissively. “Annoying habits. Emotional intimacy. That sort of thing.”Or: Andrew and Neil meet at bars and talk about life's mysteries.
Relationships: Background Matt Boyd/Danielle Wilds, Neil Josten/Andrew Minyard, background Renee Walker/Allison Reynolds
Comments: 91
Kudos: 1246





	in bars, in cars

**Author's Note:**

> happy new year! this thing has been floating around in my head for a while now but i only just got around to writing it. as usual, it turned out differently than expected, but in this case i actually like it better than the version in my head.
> 
> warnings: sex gets mentioned, imagined and discussed but not in terribly great detail (and none is actually had). a newborn baby makes a brief appearance in one scene which takes place in a hospital, though, again, no graphic descriptions of childbirth or anything of the sort. some allusions to past trauma, aftg style. some alcohol is consumed in minor quantities. 
> 
> also, i know nothing about classical music and i apologise for any nonsense resulting from that.

“Sex?”

Neil looks up from his lukewarm soda. He’s been slowly but steadily shredding the label on the bottle for the past hour, under the bartender’s amused gaze. The club is quiet tonight—as quiet as roughly a hundred decibels of rock music can be, anyway—so Neil’s been able to keep his spot at the bar, helped along by a generous tip and the fact that he doesn’t start fights. Usually.

The man is about his age and, what’s more remarkable, about his height, too. He’s broader and stockier, his hair is a wispy white blond that goes up in a blaze when the lights hit it just so, and his eyes are dark and potent like oak barrel whiskey. He’s not bad looking, Neil supposes.

“No,” Neil says anyway, “thanks.”

The man shrugs, nods and gestures at the bartender for a drink. He has nice hands. Actually, his hands are not nice at all—they look like ruins, bruised and scraped and chapped, large and veiny with fingernails bitten down to stubs and knuckles poking out like extinguished cigarette butts. Still, they’re nice. Neil imagines they can hold a man up in a moment of weakness.

For a second he tries to picture it. Going home with the guy. The heavy tang of his leather jacket, the weight of his hands on Neil’s neck. Letting him suck him off, or fuck him. Neil’s brain stalls. It’s not that he wants it. There’s no simmer of urgency, no wax-soaked candlewick arching up to the flame. Just empty musings. Like watching old reruns of Mythbusters at night.

“Something on my face?” the man says idly, tipping back his drink.

“No,” Neil says. “Just thinking.”

“About what?”

“Nothing.”

“He’s been here thinking about nothing all night,” the bartender offers, taking the man’s empty glass and refilling it.

“Aren’t we all,” the man says.

“I thought you were looking for sex,” Neil challenges, not sure why. The man laughs dryly and taps his fingers against his glass.

“Sex is nothing,” he says. “Just a way to pass the time.”

“There are more interesting ways to pass the time.”

“Like what?”

“Running,” Neil offers. “Cooking a complicated meal from scratch. Learning a language. Teaching your cat tricks.”

The bartender is back. His name is Roland. He laughs as he heaves a thing of glasses on the counter, still steaming from the dishwasher.

“Sounds like you’ve never had a good fuck,” he says, good-naturedly.

“Sounds like you need to fuck off,” Neil says, not good-naturedly.

Roland shrugs.

“If you change your mind, Andrew’s your man,” he advises, nodding at Nice Hands.

“Roland,” Andrew says. A warning.

“What?” Roland grins. “I’ve sampled the wares, you’re a damn good lay. I’m just saying, if Neil wants to expand his sexual horizons…”

“He said no.”

Roland holds up his hands. He finishes putting away the glasses and goes back to making drinks. Neil pries the last bit of paper from his bottle and drops it on the bar. Andrew must be a regular, too, if Roland knows him by name. And, well. Other things. Neil twists around to check on Dan—still dancing, still fine, still staying—and knocks back the last lukewarm dregs of his soda.

“Ask me again,” he surprises himself by saying. “Next time.”

“Why?” Andrew wants to know. Then he adds, sarcastically: “Want to _sample the wares_?”

Neil shrugs.

“No. I just…” He looks at Andrew. His steady hands. His tired eyes. “I’m still figuring it out.”

“Right,” Andrew says and slides from his seat.

Neil watches him walk away and orders another soda.

-

The bar is more crowded the next week and Neil feels hot and sticky, pressed up into a corner with his iced tea. He’s watching the dancefloor through hooded eyes, watching the exits. Wondering if the dark corners are watching him back when Andrew emerges from one, ruffled and faintly pink. Shortly after him a different guy slips out of the same hallway, equally ruffled and pink, messily tucking his shirt back in.

“Andrew,” Roland greets him. “I thought we talked about using the staff room.”

The words Neil can read mostly from his lips, the exasperation is evident in his features. Bass drips from the walls, sluicing all other sound away. It’s loud enough to make Neil’s teeth chatter.

Andrew just shrugs. A space clears up beside him and Neil moves in to order another iced tea. His ice cubes have melted, is all.

“Hey,” he says.

“Still here?” Andrew says. “Don’t you have better things to do?”

“Like what?”

“Teaching your cat a new language?” Andrew suggests slyly.

“He’s deaf,” Neil says, then adds somewhat defensively: “He knows a couple signs, though.”

“Smart,” is all Andrew says.

The space around them shrinks. Neil stands as close to Andrew as he can without touching him. He radiates body heat. Smells… Neil isn’t sure. Sweat, of course. Some sort of aftershave, probably. Not obnoxiously so; just the right amount. Neil can never get that right, so he’s stopped trying, despite Stuart’s best efforts to teach him.

There are a lot of things Neil’s failure of a father never taught him. Not that it would have ended well either way.

“Do you have pets?” Neil asks. Small-talk is another thing he struggles with these days. Especially the kind where something unspoken floats in the air between both parties like dust motes.

“Yeah,” Andrew says.

“What are their names?” Neil asks. Sweat trickles into the hollow of his breastbone.

“Kevin,” Andrew says.

“Kevin,” Neil repeats.

Andrew looks at him with a perfectly blank expression, yet Neil can’t help but feel like it’s meant to be a joke. A private joke with himself.

“If you two are done eye-fucking, could you move up and let paying customers through?” Roland calls out to them.

Neither Neil nor Andrew move. Roland rolls his eyes and keeps making drinks, muscles flexing as he shakes cocktails. Neil has heard Dan ramble drunkenly about men’s arms—he’s heard her ramble drunkenly about women’s arms, for that matter. He can’t see it, not really. The thought of being held by a stranger makes him shudder.

“Why me?”

The words are out before he knows it. The way Andrew’s eyes flick to him over the rim of his glass is the only indication that they haven’t been swallowed up whole by the music.

“Philosophically, rhetorically or metaphorically speaking?”

“Sexually,” Neil says, because he might as well. “You were interested. Last time. Why?”

Andrew puts his glass down. His thumb catches a stray drop of liquid and he lifts it to his mouth to lick it off, more of a kiss than anything else.

“Because you’re hot,” he says easily. “And I felt like it.”

Those words have added weight to them, though Neil doesn’t know why.

“Oh.”

“Is that so hard to believe?” Andrew asks.

Neil’s scars itch. He resists the urge to scratch them until they hurt and instead fiddles with his sleeves. Still covered up. Still safe.

“I don’t know,” he says. “I guess I just don’t understand it. How can you just be attracted to a complete stranger?”

“That’s the appeal,” Andrew retorts.

“What?”

“It’s a simple transaction. No complications.”

“Complications? Like what?”

“Conversation, obligations, baggage,” Andrew says dismissively. “Annoying habits. Emotional intimacy. That sort of thing.”

“Emotional intimacy is a complication?” Neil asks. Andrew looks at him like the answer should be obvious. Neil shakes his head. “That’s a feature, not a bug.”

“Is it?” Andrew drawls. “It bugs me a whole lot when people think they need to tell me their entire life story just because I sucked them off in a bathroom.”

“Does that happen to you a lot?” Neil asks, amused.

“More than you’d think.”

Andrew’s eyes drift over to the dancefloor, where the guy who followed him out of the staff room earlier is enthusiastically grinding on a different blond man. Neil presses an impending grin back into the dark corners of his mouth and spots Dan waving at him from near the exit.

“Gotta go,” he says. “See you.”

Andrew nods at him and turns back to the bar.

-

Neil tries to watch porn. As usual, it doesn’t do anything for him.

It’s too clean, too mechanical. Too transactional. He might as well be watching mannequins or abstract shapes. He’s half hard, but he’s not turned on. There’s this disconnect between his brain and his dick, like being hungry and having no appetite.

Imagining people he knows just makes it worse. Dan is like a sister to him. Roland is the same height and build as his father. Robin, the girl who works at the bodega down the street, is too young. Andrew…

Andrew might as well be a stranger.

Neil closes the laptop. He masturbates, but his heart isn’t in it and he just feels gross and sad after. Maybe this is what it’s like for everyone and people who say otherwise are just fooling themselves. Or maybe it’s just another way Neil’s childhood has left him broken and unfit. He showers, changes his sheets. Puts on his most comfortable, fleece-lined pair of sweatpants and sets about making pizza. Kneading the dough releases more tension than his orgasm did. He listens to music—Vivaldi’s Winter, blasting loud enough to piss off his neighbours, and Neil almost hopes they’ll complain. He digs his fingers into the dough and squeezes until the anger drains out of him. Then he washes his hands, covers the dough to let it rise, and sits on his sofa in the ringing silence.

Steinway wakes at the shifting weight on the sofa and blinks at him. Neil reaches out a hand and lets him sniff the yeasty smell of the dough that still clings to his skin, then soothes the frizzy white hairs around his ears. Steinway sighs and goes back to sleep.

His phone buzzes. It’s Stuart. Neil lets it go to voicemail. His fingers are still buzzing with a strange sort of energy, so he lifts the cover on his piano and slides onto the stool, smooths his hands over the keys. Slams them down and listens to the discordant sounds. He starts playing the first thing that crosses his mind. It sounds vaguely like Carol Of The Bells, but not quite. Like the melody has gone mouldy under his fingers.

He goes back into the kitchen and grabs a head of garlic from the bowl on the counter. He peels it methodically, then smashes each clove with the hilt of his knife until the whole kitchen reeks of garlic. He won’t need that much for his pizza, but it feels cleansing.

He washes his hands again, rubbing basil-scented soap into every nook and cranny.

His phone buzzes. This time Neil answers.

“Hey,” Dan says. “I need to get out of here. Wanna hang out?”

“I’ve got pizza,” Neil says, relief slicing through him. It feels hot and bright, like the blade of a sharp knife seconds before the pain catches up with the realisation of the cut.

He hates being alone.

-

“Yes or no?” Andrew asks, glancing at the door marked Staff Only and raising an eyebrow.

Neil thinks about it. There’s not a mote of interest in him, though. He’s too full; stuffed with pizza and laughter and sozzled with wine that Dan brought over. His earlier masturbation session has scoured any lingering traces of physical need from him, and his hands and clothes still smell like garlic despite his best efforts.

“No,” he says. “Not… now.”

Andrew squints at him.

“Are you drunk?”

Neil shakes his head. He feels bloated and scratchy-warm, like wearing a rough woollen sweater two sizes too small. The room swims. The club is an aquarium brimming with indigo light. The air is briny with sweat and alcohol and people pulse in its depths like luminous jellyfish, limbs billowing in the current of the music. Dan is in there somewhere, dancing with a guy. Neil is content to sit on the sidelines and pickle himself in broody silence.

“What did you take?” Andrew asks, frowning.

“Nothing,” Neil says truthfully. “I had some wine, that’s all.”

Andrew is still frowning, blocking Neil from the rest of the room like a protective barrier. He picks up Neil’s water and sniffs it before pouring it out onto the floor.

“Hey!” Neil protests. “I’m trying to sober up.”

“I thought you weren’t drunk.”

“I’m not,” Neil grumbles, signalling to Roland for another bottle. “How’s Kevin?”

Andrew looks at him blankly.

“Your pet. Your not-pet,” Neil explains.

“Fine,” Andrew says. Then, after a pause: “What are you doing here, Neil?”

“Same thing I do every night,” Neil says. When Andrew doesn’t react, he adds in a grave voice: “Try to take over the world.”

Andrew continues to look at him.

“It’s a Pinky and the Brain reference,” Neil says sadly.

“I know that,” Andrew says. “You’re avoiding the question.”

“No, I’m avoiding the answer,” Neil corrects.

“Well, stop it,” Andrew growls.

“Fine. As you can see, I am sitting,” Neil declares with a sigh, gesturing at himself. “I am sitting and thinking about nothing, because that’s all I am. Nothing.”

“You could do that at home with your cat,” Andrew says.

“My friend wanted to dance,” Neil hums, waving in Dan’s direction. “I keep her company.”

“How noble,” Andrew snorts. “Why are you not dancing with her, then?”

“I don’t dance. And if I did, people would think I’m her boyfriend, and she wouldn’t get laid.”

Andrew is quiet, but he keeps watching Neil out of the corner of his eyes.

“You don’t add up,” he says at last.

“Neither do you,” Neil retorts. “And yet here we are.”

They eye each other for a while. Andrew opens his mouth and draws breath as if to say something, but gets interrupted.

“Neil,” Dan says, disentangling herself from the roiling seaweed and the glittering clouds of sand that make up the dancefloor. Behind her trails a guy, caught up in the net of her hand. “This is Matt. I’m going home with him, okay?”

Neil scrutinises Matt. He’s tall and fit, t-shirt straining over his pecs, but his eyes are soft and mushy and full of awe when he looks at Dan.

“Hi,” Matt says, belatedly. “I’m Matt. Nice to meet you.”

Neil turns back to Dan.

“Alright. Call me if you need anything.”

Dan nods and squeezes Matt’s hand. Her gaze snags on something next to Neil.

“Andrew,” she says, guarded.

“Wilds,” Andrew says, equally guarded.

“You know each other?” Neil asks. Dan looks back to him and some of the stiffness melts from her shoulders.

“Distantly,” she says. “Via Renee.”

“Oh,” Neil says. He’s never warmed to Renee. “It’s okay, you can go. Andrew is looking after me.”

“He is?” Dan asks at the same time as Andrew says, “I am?”

“Yes,” Neil says firmly.

Dan looks dubious, then shakes her head. She digs in her pocket and comes up with a handful of cash.

“Take a taxi,” she tells him. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

Neil doesn’t want to take the money, but Dan tucks it in the breast pocket of his shirt and pats it down, squeezing his shoulder briefly. Then she’s gone, swallowed up by the deep sea.

“I can drive you,” Andrew offers.

“What about the sex?” Neil hums absently, watching the mass of dancers writhing like a thousand eels. He’s not looking forward to pushing through them in order to get to the door. He should have kept a closer look on the exits.

“Come on,” Andrew says, poking him. Neil swats at his hand and nearly loses his balance in the process.

Somehow, Andrew finds a way out that Neil missed. The cool night air rinses the sting of salt from his skin and his eyeballs don’t feel like they’re going to pop from the pressure anymore. Neil follows Andrew to a sleek black car and wonders for a moment if he should get in. Then he remembers that he’s currently the most dangerous thing in this garage and that he has nothing to lose anymore, nothing to hide. He flexes his fingers and slides into the passenger seat.

The leather makes a sound like freshly fallen snow under his weight.

Andrew starts the car and eases it out of the garage. Neil tells him to drop him off outside the bodega. The scar on his collarbone has been hurting all night, a low-level thrum of acid burning just under his skin. Something to do with nerve damage, maybe. A restless ghost of his father’s knife, trapped in Neil’s nervous system, going around and around and around.

He closes his eyes against the glare of the streetlamps.

“Stay awake,” Andrew orders. “We’re almost there.”

Neil’s ears are still filled with water, but Andrew’s voice is clear as a fishing line. He bites.

Andrew stops the car by the bodega as promised and watches as Neil clambers out.

“Thanks,” Neil mutters. Yawns. “Ask me again, next time. About the sex.”

“Sure,” Andrew says slowly. There’s something ashen in his eyes, but not dead. Still-warm and barely-there, like all Neil has to do is blow on the embers to coax them back to life.

“Good night, Andrew,” he says.

Andrew says nothing. Neil fumbles with his sleeves and turns around, starts to walk in the direction of his apartment. He hears the rumble of Andrew’s car behind him, receding like the tide, and hopes he’ll be back.

-

Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata. One of Chopin’s Nocturnes—Neil can never remember which one it is—and Mozart’s Fantasia in D minor. Those and a cup of jasmine tea are Neil’s hangover cure on Sunday, though he doesn’t really have a hangover, just a faint echo of a headache blubbering behind his temples.

He goes for a run to clear out the rest of it, then soaks in the bath until his fingers are shrivelly and his head feels woozy. Steam licks at his bare skin as he climbs out and wraps himself in a towel. He makes the mistake of sitting on the sofa and Steinway jumps on his lap immediately, kneading his towel and purring. It’s quiet and breathy sound, and Neil gently removes his long tail from his face and scratches his back.

Last night’s wine bottle is lined up neatly by the sink. Dan rinsed it out and stuck a candle in it. The wax has spilled down the neck of the bottle, there’s still a few drips of it on the coffee table. Neil’s jeans lie in an abandoned puddle on the floor and he picks them up, checking the pockets before they go in the laundry basket. There’s a folded slip of paper in one of them and Neil pulls it out.

It’s a phone number and a name.

Neil closes Dan’s last message—a picture of a breakfast tray balanced on her knees, captioned ‘ _he’s a keeper! xxx’_ —and types in the number before hitting call.

“What.”

The voice on the other end is scratchy and rough.

“Did I wake you up?” Neil asks, amused. There’s some rustling and the sound of a door closing.

“No,” Andrew says. “You sound way too cheerful for someone who was definitely drunk last night.”

“Was not.”

“Was too. Renee says you’re a lightweight.”

“Renee?” Neil says, stomach twisting uneasily.

“Yes,” Andrew says. “Contrary to what you might think, people talk about you when you’re not there.”

“Why,” Neil blurts out. He probably should have put on some clothes before calling Andrew, but Steinway is still so comfortable in his lap.

“It’s beyond me,” Andrew says dryly.

Neil is quiet. He pets Steinway, who digs his claws lovingly into his thighs in thanks.

“What are you doing,” Andrew asks.

“Nothing,” Neil says truthfully. “I need to get dressed, but my cat is sitting on me.”

Andrew coughs a bit.

“Are you telling me you’re naked right now?”

“Maybe,” Neil teases. Then he looks down at the mutilated canvas of his torso and grabs a blanket to wrap around his shoulders even though Andrew can’t see him. “What are you up to?”

“Nothing,” Andrew replies blankly.

“Want to do something?”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know,” Neil says. “There’s a matinée at the music hall downtown. We could go.”

“A matinée,” Andrew echoes, an edge of disbelief in his flat voice.

“And lunch,” Neil adds, feeling bold. “Dumplings, in Chinatown?”

Andrew is silent. Then: “Fine. But it’s not a date.”

“No,” Neil agrees. “Not a date.”

“Fine,” Andrew says again.

“The matinée starts at two,” Neil tells him, suppressing a laugh at Andrew’s muffled curse. “Meet you at the north entrance to Chinatown in twenty minutes?”

“Fuck off,” Andrew says and hangs up.

-

Thirty minutes later, Andrew is standing next to him in line at the dumpling stall. His clothes are clean and neat, but Neil can see signs of a struggle with his hair and remnants of pillow creases on his cheek.

He decides not to say anything. The smugness must still be visible in his expression, though, because Andrew tells him to shut up and then proceeds to fiddle with his hair for the next five minutes, squinting at his distorted reflection in the nearest shop window.

They get a selection of hot, steaming dumplings stuffed with meat and vegetables and Andrew buys a few skewers of baked bananas drenched in honey. The red paper lanterns buck and shudder in the wind and chipped, gold-painted dragons bear down on them with wild eyes as they huddle under an awning. The air is damp. Puddles lurk on the ground, snatching at careless feet. Andrew licks honey from his fingers and glares up at the grey sky, which is still studded with clouds like burrs clinging to fabric.

“It better not rain,” he growls.

The sky is unimpressed by his warning. They are thoroughly soaked by the time they get to the music hall and Neil pays for their tickets while Andrew is busy looking for a place to dump his dripping umbrella. He gets a sour look for that and shrugs it off.

There’s a hushed, almost festive sort of silence inside the parlour. Neil chooses seats close to the exit and sinks into the plush velvet chair, tugging on the cuffs of his shirt.

“You clean up surprisingly well,” Andrew murmurs, glancing around. It’s a compliment, but Andrew manages to make it sound like an insult regardless.

“Thanks,” Neil says dryly. He wants to say more, but the pianist steps out and Neil closes his mouth. He’s here for the music, after all.

-

They don’t see each other for a while.

Neil isn’t sure if he should feel guilty. He promised Andrew it wouldn’t be a date, but maybe something he did made it into a date anyway. All he knows is he enjoyed spending time with Andrew.

He gives him space.

Until they run into each other at the bar again. And again.

And again.

Andrew drives Neil home. They split a taxi. Neil drives Andrew to Renee’s. They walk to the bus stop together, but go in different directions. Neil drives Dan to Matt’s place, then comes back to pick Andrew up and deliver him to his cousin’s place. Andrew gets drunk and lets Neil drive him home, but doesn’t invite him in.

“Fussy roommate,” he says, before closing the door in Neil’s face.

Sometimes Andrew picks up a guy. Then Neil sits at the bar, chewing his nails or building sculptures out of toothpicks, until Andrew comes back.

“You should tell him,” Roland calls out over the music, leaning across the bar. He smells sharply of aftershave and Neil leans backwards, out of his space.

“Tell him what?”

Roland nods towards the staff room and raises his eyebrows.

“No,” Neil says. “That’s not it.”

It’s not. True to Neil’s request, Andrew keeps asking him. Not always, but most of the time. Neil still hasn’t said yes. He doesn’t know why he doesn’t tell Andrew to stop, but he figures Andrew will grow tired of the game eventually.

Roland shrugs, clearly not believing him, and goes back to mixing cocktails.

-

“Ask me,” Neil says, on the way to the car. Andrew offered to drive him home, and Neil is too tired to play their game anymore.

“Ask you what?” Andrew says, his voice like a newly sharpened blade.

“Ask me if I want to sleep with you.”

Andrew is silent for a moment. Then he swings himself into the driver’s seat and slams the door shut. Neil stays where he is, waiting.

“I’m not doing this with you,” Andrew says, agitated. “You’re having a nervous breakdown. Get in the car.”

“I’m really not,” Neil says. “Just ask me, Andrew.”

“No.”

Neil sits down, but doesn’t close the door.

“You’re not interested in sex,” Andrew says lowly. “You made that clear many times. Why now?”

“Why not?” Neil retorts. “Am I not allowed to change my mind?”

“Whatever your question is, I’m not your answer,” Andrew says.

The silence feels heavy after that. Neil pulls the door closed, but Andrew doesn’t start the car. Neil kneads his sleeves in his hands and tries to ignore the buzzing in his finger joints.

“Sorry,” he says. Then, quieter: “Will you still ask me?”

“Not tonight,” Andrew says, sounding tired. “But yes.”

Something eases in Neil’s chest.

“Thank you.”

A phone rings. Andrew pulls it out of his pocket and answers. Neil looks out of the window at the empty, desolately lit garage.

“What do you mean, early? Right. Yes. I’m on my way.”

He hangs up. Neil looks at him questioningly and Andrew hesitates.

“I have to go somewhere,” he says.

“Oh,” Neil says.

Andrew sighs.

“Don’t look at me like that.”

“Okay,” Neil says and looks out of the window again. “Do you want me to call a taxi?”

For a moment, Andrew thinks about it. Then he shakes his head.

“No. I’ll drive you home after.”

-

They end up at the hospital.

Andrew strides in, past the reception and to the nearest elevator like he knows exactly where he’s going. His jaw is clenched tight. The hallways smell like disinfectant and lukewarm coffee. They pass a nurse’s station and a young woman sticks her head out at the sight of them.

“Oh! Dr Minyard, I thought you were next door.”

Andrew shrugs, about to breeze past.

“Clarice,” someone says, stepping out of a doorway. He looks like Andrew, except with shorter hair and bigger bags under his eyes. “We talked about not letting me in without my badge, remember?”

“Oh,” Clarice says, flustered. “Sorry, Dr Minyard.”

“You mean this badge?” Andrew says, flashing something.

“Oh, fuck off,” his doppelganger grumbles, snatching it back and attaching it to his shirt. “She’s in room 310. Who’s that?”

“Neil.”

“Hi,” Neil says, skirting past in Andrew’s wake.

“Answer your phone some time, you fuck!” Andrew’s doppelganger calls after him. Andrew gives him the finger over his shoulder and breezes down the corridor, until they reach room 310.

“What’s in there?” Neil asks.

“Renee,” Andrew replies.

“I’ll wait outside then,” Neil says hastily, but Andrew grabs his jacket and pulls. Neil tumbles into the room after him, sees Renee on a bed, holding a small bundle of blankets. A tall, regal-looking blonde stands next to her. They both look tired but happy.

“Andrew,” Renee says, her face crinkling into a smile.

Andrew bends over her and kisses her cheek, then checks the contents of the blanket bundle.

“Why is it so small,” he says, frowning. “Shouldn’t it be bigger?”

“I can’t imagine,” the other woman says dryly. “Seeing as you’re both so tall.”

“She’s fine, Andrew,” Renee says. “All babies are small. She was just a bit overeager. Allison, be nice.”

Allison huffs and crosses her arms, but doesn’t move from Renee’s side. Neil tries to back out undetected, but Allison’s eyes catch the movement.

“Who’s that?”

“Neil,” Andrew says vaguely again, still eyeing the baby in Renee’s arms.

“Oh?” Renee smiles, glancing between them. “Hello, Neil. I’m happy for you.”

“That’s the baby hormones,” Andrew says. “I told you they were going to addle your brain.”

“Mind how you talk to my wife,” Allison growls.

“Thank you, Andrew,” Renee says earnestly, cradling the baby close again. “Thank you for her. I couldn’t have done it without you.”

“You could have gone to a sperm bank,” Andrew snorts. “Don’t make this about me.”

“Trust me, I was all for it,” Allison sniffs.

Renee ignores them. Her dark eyes find Neil again and she winks.

“Andrew is something special. Isn’t he, Neil?”

Neil takes another step back.

“I’m going to get coffee,” he says, before fleeing the room.

-

“Play something,” Andrew demands, his fingers hovering over the gleaming surface of Neil’s piano, just short of touching it.

That moment, Neil thinks. The moment just before touching.

He shivers and sits down. He can feel Andrew’s body heat, but Andrew doesn’t move away.

“Any requests?” Neil asks.

Andrew shrugs. Neil plays Flight Of The Bumblebee, because it’s fast and fun and he maybe wants to show off a bit. He has a feeling Andrew doesn’t know a lot of classical music, so he follows it up with a piano version of Bohemian Rhapsody, then something from Star Wars. Steinway ruins the last bit of it by jumping up and lying down on top of the keys and Neil’s hands, and Neil laughs.

“He likes the vibrations,” he explains. “Or maybe he just wants my attention.”

“Pathetic,” Andrew says.

“Hey, don’t be rude to my cat.”

They’re silent for a moment. Neil pulls his fingers out from underneath Steinway’s long body and flexes them.

“You could have told me. About Renee.”

“I just jerked off into a cup,” Andrew says dismissively. “The baby is hers and Allison’s.”

“Is it?” Neil asks, watching him.

Andrew looks away.

“For what it’s worth, I think you’d make a good parent,” Neil says.

Andrew rolls his eyes and walks into Neil’s kitchen. Neil can hear him rummage for the hot chocolate mix Neil bought after Andrew started to stick around more often. Neil can’t remember when it happened, but he’s grown used to having Andrew nosing through his stuff. Sometimes Neil even buys something ridiculous just to see Andrew’s reaction when he finds it.

“Andrew?” Neil says when Andrew comes back, noisily stirring a cup of hot chocolate.

He watches as Andrew takes a cautious sip. Takes in the mismatched socks he’s wearing, printed with cartoon bees. The white cat hair on his black jeans. The sweater Neil borrowed once after spilling tomato sauce all over his shirt.

The faint chocolate moustache on his upper lip.

“What,” Andrew prompts.

“There’s a complication,” Neil says.

He waits.

_Conversation, obligations, baggage. Annoying habits. Emotional intimacy._

“You don’t have to ask me again,” Neil says when he can’t stand the silence anymore. “It’s okay. I understand.”

Andrew still doesn’t say anything. Neil plays a few chords around Steinway, then puts his hands in his lap. Steinway jumps down, stretching.

“Can I ask you something?”

Andrew twirls his hand in a _go on_ gesture.

“I’d like to kiss you,” Neil says. “Yes or no?”

His heart is a hummingbird. His fingers crackle with static.

Andrew says, “No.”

Neil nods. He hadn’t really expected a different answer. He starts to turn back to the piano, but Andrew isn’t done yet.

“Ask me again,” he says, quietly.

“Okay,” Neil says and plays.

-

Dan has her last exam at the end of March. Neil and Matt both wait for her outside the community college building, sitting in a paltry patch of sunlight.

“How’s Andrew?” Matt asks.

“Fine,” Neil says. He picks at a loose thread on his sleeve and jiggles his leg.

“Awesome,” Matt says. “Have you, you know. Figured things out yet?”

“No,” Neil says peevishly. He’s tired of everyone following up on his non-existent love life.

“I believe in you, buddy,” Matt says, going for a bracing smile. He’s distracted from the impending pep talk by Dan walking out, and Neil leaves him to deliver the flowers he brought and stares at his feet.

They celebrate that night, and Neil inevitably ends up at the bar next to Andrew.

“Take me home?” he asks, surveying the claustrophobic swell of the crowd around them. Someone shoves into Neil from behind and he stumbles, right into Andrew’s steadying hand.

He wasn’t wrong about those hands. They really can hold a man up in a moment of weakness.

“Now?” Andrew asks.

“Now,” Neil says.

He lets Andrew push ahead through the crowd, following close behind. Neil doesn’t bother to try and find Dan or Matt, he just texts them to let them know he’s leaving. The sky outside is speckled with stars. Neil tugs Andrew to a stop.

“Andrew,” he says and waits until he turns around. “Can I kiss you?”

Andrew looks down to where Neil’s fingers are hooked into his jacket pocket. He plucks them out and slides their hands together loosely, squeezing once before letting go.

He says, “Yes.”

Neil abruptly needs something to hold on to and catches his hand back in his own, twining their fingers together.

“Seriously?”

“Yes,” Andrew huffs, scowling.

“Really, truly, honestly?”

“Fuck off,” Andrew mutters, leaning in.

And kissing—

Kissing is something Neil can get behind.

-

Neil wakes up to a soft weight shifting on the blanket around his feet. He opens his eyes and peers down, catching a small black cat in the act of making a nest in the hollow between his knees. Two huge eyes stare back at him, then the little creature scurries off as fast as its stubby legs can carry it.

A cup of coffee enters his field of vision and Neil sighs.

“So,” he says, sitting up and taking the cup, “that’s your fussy roommate?”

“She is _usually_ fussy,” Andrew says archly, glaring at the tip of a fluffy black tail poking out underneath the armchair.

“I’m a cat whisperer,” Neil hums smugly. “What’s her name?”

“Ben.”

“Ben?” Neil echoes, dubiously.

“Nevis,” Andrew supplies reluctantly.

“Like the whiskey?” Neil laughs.

“Says the guy who called his deaf cat after a piano,” Andrew retorts.

“Point taken,” Neil says and takes a sip of his coffee. “This is good.”

“You wouldn’t know good coffee if it pranced past you wearing nothing but a tiara,” Andrew replies.

“Interesting visual. At least I know that black tea and green tea are made from the same plant.”

“Shut up.”

Andrew gets up and stretches. His t-shirt slips up, revealing a glimpse of hipbones and happy trail. Neil thinks he could get used to that.

“Breakfast is in the kitchen,” Andrew mutters, padding off on bare feet. The cat streaks after him, probably hoping to be fed as well. Neil disentangles his feet from the blanket and makes a half-hearted attempt at restoring the fold-out sofa to its usual size before giving up and trailing after Andrew and the cat.

The kitchen is tiny. An expensive espresso machine and a large fridge are crammed under a slanted ceiling, probably with the help of magic. Rain patters against the window above the sink. Andrew hands him a plate of French toast, crispy and perfect and topped with fresh berries.

“This is really good,” Neil says through a mouthful of food. Andrew shoots him an unimpressed look and keeps shovelling toast into his mouth.

They do the dishes in companionable silence. Neil takes a shower in Andrew’s cramped bathroom, hitting his head on the low ceiling more than once. He borrows another sweater. It smells like Andrew and he hooks the collar up over his nose and inhales deeply.

“Freak,” Andrew says.

“You like it,” Neil grins, popping back out of the collar. “You like me.”

“Pfft,” Andrew makes, but doesn’t object. Neil pulls him into another kiss and Andrew determinedly sets about turning his knees to jelly.

“Not fair,” Neil murmurs against his mouth.

“Let me know if you want your dick sucked after all,” Andrew murmurs back. “I’m not gonna ask again.”

“What if I want more French toast?” Neil teases.

“Make it yourself.”

“Guess I’ll have to settle for more kissing, then,” Neil sighs. “Poor old me.”

Andrew grabs a fistful of his sweater and shoves him, following until he has Neil pressed up against the wall.

It’s not the worst place to be.

“More kissing,” Neil demands, curling his hand into the downy hair at the nape of Andrew’s neck and feeling him shiver. He tacks on a cheeky: “Yes or no?”

“Yes,” Andrew says, leaning in. In the brief moment before their lips are touching, he adds, almost too quiet for Neil to hear: “Don’t stop asking.”

Neil already knows he never will.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading! if you liked this fic, leave me a comment or kudos, and/or follow me on tumblr over at [annawrites](https://annawrites.tumblr.com/)!


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